Tacoma Public Schools is changing its bell schedule for the 2024–25 school year. Some parents are excited about the shifts. Others have concerns.
Class would start later for kids in high school but a tad earlier for middle school and certain elementary school students, according to the district’s plan .
“Transportation changes to bus route schedules impact school bell schedules in the 2024-25 school year,” TPS spokesperson Kathryn McCarthy told The News Tribune via email. “The need for a more efficient system drove the change. These updates reduce the number of bus routes, which will save about $1 million in transportation costs per year.”
The updates being made, according to McCarthy, are:
“High school would start at 8:05 a.m. and end at 2:35 p.m.
Middle school would start at 7:40 a.m. and end at 2:10 p.m.
Some elementary schools would start at 8:40; some would start at 9. That will be determined in May and will be communicated to families at that time.”
The current bell schedule is:
- High school: 7:35 a.m. to 2:05 p.m.
- Middle school: 8:15 a.m. to 2:45 p.m.
- Elementary school: 9 a.m. to 3:30 p.m.
McCarthy acknowledged that the changes will affect families. The district considered multiple factors in the decision, she said, including the support that parents expressed for later high-school starts.
“[W]e’ll share any other information that is confirmed by our before- and after-school community partners, along with details for athletics and other extracurricular activities in the 2024-2025 school year,” she added. “Families can expect finalized bus routes in August.”
One thing staying the same: late-start Wednesdays.
Parents giving new schedule mixed reviews
Parents on social media have both backed and booed the idea of a new bell schedule.
Jay Spencer, who has two kids in the district (third and sixth grade) and another enrolling in the fall, noted that elementary-school students are starting after their upper-level counterparts. Evidence suggests that for middle and high school students , later start times correlate with improved grades .
Kids in that age range are also fairly independent. By contrast, elementary-aged kids require more attention from their parents, Spencer said, so starting school at 9 a.m. is difficult for caretakers with jobs. Relying on part-time child care can be expensive, too.
“I think [the schedule is] hard for working parents,” Spencer said, “and that it’s kind of counter to the best research on what the best learning environments are for the kids.”
Leah Browning is the parent of a fourth grader, two high school and two middle school kids in the district. She told The News Tribune via email that rather than focusing on the potential inconvenience for parents, it’s important to prioritize teens’ health.
Browning supports later start times, particularly for students in high school and middle school.
“Studies show many benefits of a later start time and teens needing more sleep — even more than children!” she wrote, citing research.
More than 7 in 10 high school students and nearly 60% of middle school kids don’t catch enough Zs on school nights, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. That lack of sleep is viewed as a critical public health issue by the American Academy of Pediatrics.
Michelle Puller-Soto said she found out about the Tacoma Public School bell changes from Reddit before receiving a district email. She has concerns about how the bus schedule will get altered.
Puller-Soto doesn’t think that her middle school-aged son will like the new, earlier bell schedule. She worries that it will mean he’ll have to catch the school bus before the sun rises in the winter, as early as 6:45 a.m.
Puller-Soto said she’s seen people doing drugs at that time in her neighborhood.
“Him and his friends are going to be going out in the dead of night to catch the bus, and that does worry me a lot,” she said. “So I figure I’ll go to the bus stop with him. My kid, he’s special needs — it’s like, I worry. I worry about him a lot.”
Late-start Wednesdays unpopular among some
Tacoma Public Schools is sticking to late-start Wednesdays in the next school year.
McCarthy told The News Tribune that the district isn’t the only one in Washington that has start-late or end-early days. In the 2020–21 school year, TPS launched late-start Wednesdays to give teachers and staff more time to prep and plan. The day was picked after the district sent out a survey to staff and families in 2019, she said.
“TPS has worked with community partners at the elementary level to increase access to before-school care for families,” McCarthy added, “and we continue to look for ways to support families.”
Not everyone likes the late start.
As the single dad of a fourth-grade student, Wednesday mornings for Hyon Kil are tough. He works in general contracting and construction, so getting to a job site as late as 10:30 a.m. can be challenging: “The moment I drop her off, I’ve got to split, because I’m already late, pretty much.”
For Kil, it would be easier if schools instead let out early on Wednesdays. He said he’s spoken with other single parents in the district who feel the same way about the late starts.
In a perfect world, he added, the school schedule would be the same each day.
“If we’re training these kids to be ready for the real world, how’s that doing it?” Kil said. “These kids are going to be in the workplace, [where] you don’t get late arrivals on Wednesdays.”
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